


A Mother’s Love

by ScreamQueenBee (screamqueenbee)



Category: Norse Mythology, Thor (2011)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-19
Updated: 2012-06-19
Packaged: 2017-11-08 02:32:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/438174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/screamqueenbee/pseuds/ScreamQueenBee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the death of his rival, Loki receives a visit from his mother</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Mother’s Love

Frigga excused herself from the halls of Gladsheim, and the vicious rumors regarding her middle son, for the afternoon. She chose instead to see her Loki in his own hall, far from the golden city and deep in the forests where her sons used to play at being warriors and heroes.

_Her sons…_ She thought as she entered the stables, the warm smell of horses and leather and hay comforting to her frayed nerves. _She may not have given them all life, but they were her sons nonetheless. And where were they now? Scattered across the Nine Realms and far from her protective influence. Thor, her little soldier and champion, banned from his home until such a time as he learned wisdom and humility. And her precious Loki, a living duality fueled by self-hatred, constantly moving between Midgard, Jotunnheim, and the spaces between the realms because he didn’t feel welcome in any place._

__

One of the stable hands brought her horse, handing her the reins and wishing her a safe journey. In the stalls on either side of her were Loki and Thor’s horses, calmly staring at each other. She wished that her family could tolerate being in each others’ company like their horses.

“Do not allow my husband to remove the warmounts from any of the stables.” She told the boy as she swung up into the saddle.

_He will not wage war this day._ The Queen told herself and willed it to be so.

“None of the horses will leave to grounds today, your majesty.” He assured her before stepping to the side. Frigga nodded and spurred her horse forward and out of the stable.

The city passed Frigga in blurred streaks of color, then everything turned to green fields and orchards, and finally lush hunting forests. She slowed her horse to a walk and closed in on the edge of her eldest son’s territory. Thor’s hall was more of a hunting lodge than anything, and she could count too many times that hunting trips had turned into raucous feasts that lasted for weeks on end. Now the hall was cold and lifeless, a ghost of its former glory and a constant reminder of how broken the royal family truly was.

She remembered one golden day when her two oldest children were young and friends and her husband was not so distant from her. They’d been so /happy/ and everything had been perfect. Then her boys grew up and the truth about Loki’s heritage was found out. Frigga had known that everything would end up here, her family torn to shreds and she could do nothing to mend it. She shook her head slightly and spurred her horse on deeper in the forest, pretending that the tears in her eyes were from the wind.

The boundaries of Loki’s land were marked by a single stone archway, the stone etched deeply with intricate scrollwork, and nothing else. Frigga knew there was an impossibly complex network of wards protecting the estate and the inhabitants against those with ill intent. The enemies of her son couldn’t step foot beyond the gate, but the Queen passed without hindrance and rode straight through to the stables. When her horse was watered and stalled, Frigga entered Loki’s house, announcing her presence to the echoing rooms. After a short search of the open and airy first floor, she found a trail of Midgardian clothing that led to the sleeping chamber’s open door.

The spacious room was a mess, it seemed that every item from his chamber in Gladsheim (and she suspected Sigyn Iwaldidottir’s as well) had found their way here. She stepped carefully around boots and books and unfamiliar Midgardian technology, sitting at the edge of the bed in a space that her son’s long limbs did not occupy. Loki was asleep, a small disturbance in the bed’s otherwise perfect coverings.

Even in sleep, Loki looked troubled and restless; his brow creased slightly, fingers twitching under the blankets. Nightmares, she guessed. Why did they have to plague her children so?

“Loki,” Frigga said quietly, pushing the hood of his shirt away from his face and brushing a soothing hand down his neck to shake his shoulder. There was a thin green thread feeding loud music into his ear, she removed it so he could hear her. “Child, wake up.”

It took a moment for Loki to bring himself to wakefulness, the queen could see the clear disconnect between where he had been in his mind and where he was physically in his eyes.

“Mother?” His voice was sleep-rough and confused as he pushed himself up on his elbows. Frigga sighed when she saw the bruises marring his exposed skin. She’d always thought Theoric rather barbaric, but now that she was seeing the results of his barbarism… against her own son, no less. The queen could barely contain her rage. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask the same question of you.” She said, taking in every changed facet of the young god’s appearance. He looked thinner and paler than she’d remembered, the bones in his face far sharper and his green eyes too bright. “And when did it change from “Mama” to “Mother,” Loki?”

Loki looked away, sliding off the other side of the bed. Frigga knew that look all too well and readied herself for a very difficult conversation.

“It changed when I found out I wasn’t your son.” He told her quietly. “’Mama’ seemed far too intimate a name for the son of the enemy to call a woman like you. I don’t deserve the pleasure of it.”

Frigga sighed and caught Loki by the shoulder, turning him around and sitting him on his bed like she used to when he was a child.

“Loki, would things really have been better for you if you had known? Should we have told you from the very start that you were one of the Jotnar? Only you, no one else would know.” He opened his mouth to argue, but Frigga held up a hand for him to stop. “Please, dear heart, don’t interrupt me. Would your life had been better, knowing that you so unlike those around you? Thinking that you don’t belong here?”

  “I don’t belong here, Mama. I’m not Aesir, I’m not considered Jotun.” His voice was frantic and frustrated at repeating an argument that he had convinced himself was the only truth in his life. Loki’s face dropped to his hands and his shoulders slumped. “No one wanted me…” He mumbled. Frigga put a comforting arm around her son, pulling him close.

“For the first time, you are so far from the truth.” She told him, feeling her heart break at his words and the slight catch in his voice. “I wanted you. Everything happens for a reason, and you were left so I could find you.” Loki raised his head to look up at her and Frigga brushed his hair behind his ear, for a moment catching sight of the thick black tattoos he hid from everyone. Right then, she wasn’t Asgard’s Queen or the most powerful woman in the Nine Realms, she was just a mother trying to comfort her hurting child. “You are my son, just as much as Thor, Baldr, and Tyr are. I love you and, even though they do not show it, your father and brothers do too. You are my little star and I wish that you would come home.”

The Queen’s eyes were stinging with tears, and her voice broke as she spoke her next words. “You are a son of Asgard, it does not matter where you were born. A prince of Asgard and the King of Jotunnheim and, no matter what you do or where you go, I want you to understand how _proud_ I am of the man you’ve become.”

King of Monsters, Lackeyson, and God of Lies and False Things; Frigga didn’t care what they called him. Loki was just a child who’d lost his way, and she didn’t know why Asgard couldn’t understand that. She held her son as gently as she could when his shoulders started to shake with silently sobbing and didn’t stop even when he’d fallen asleep.


End file.
